A newbie's thoughts on Superfan

[blueguy]

As for the gamemix channel. I agree that most HD viewers won't be using this channel. At least not very much.

-JustBob

I'd rather watch 8 SD games over 1 HD game. And I have HD. The difference in being able to watch 6/8 games at once easily trumps HD quality in my book.

Watching one game at a time = absolute boredom. And with the dorky setup used by DTV, I'd have drag an HD receiver back to my living room to at least get a split screen.

 

[Drifty]

I just activated D* last Friday, asked for ST and got the big dog package free for 4 months. They are charging me $69.99 a month for 4 months for ST as a new subscriber.

I asked for Superfan as well and in a polite, yet firm manner I stated that $49.99 would be fair for Superfan since all the functionality isn't available yet until the interactive STB's are rolled out. The CSR said now that I am an existing customer with ST, Superfan would cost just the $49.99. I'm happy! Its a bonus that channel 98 I think had some preseason games in HD last weekend. We will see what next year brings in terms of pricing, packages and PO'd subs.
Cheers....

 

[vurbano]

To all concerned about having to pay for Superfan to get the HD games,
A CSR at D* told me that the HD games would still come with the regular ST plan.

The CSR is Wrong.

 

[gman1010]

called on sunday and asked for the custumer retention dept. told them i wanted to to order st but wanted the superfan for free.i got it no problem if you talk to right peolple you will get it free.

 

[GLBorchert]

I'm with you. $99 is a fair price for 100 HD games.

My justification is that I've chosen this route - ST + Superfan - as opposed to attending any live games. Probably not what the NFL wants, people choosing to stay home and watch their choice on HDTV, but it's the route I'm going.

I live In the Dallas area. At between $50 and $100 per seat, plus $15 for parking and $25 per person for food and drink, taking a family of four to one live NFL game costs as much or more than a season's worth of ST+SF.

 

[Jimbo]

GLBorchert,

Have you done the Sunday Ticket before ?
If you live in Dallas, The Cowboys will not be on the ST for you.
However you can use your antenna or cable channel to pick it up.
Blackouts is how the NFL keeps people going to thier local games

Jimbo

 

[donyoop]

Well, after much agonizing thought, I ordered the Superfan last Tuesday to get the $49 price. I, like many of you here, am opposed to the HD tax. Lack of HD out of market games isn't worth the protest to me.

I would like to bring up the point that if we pay a premium for Superfan, we should get a premium service. I expect Shortcuts, GameMix, and the RedZone channel to all be in high def as well as SD for the price we are paying. I am also cynical enough to understand that Directv is not that advanced... they may be re-thinking TV but not from a high def standpoint.

I will try out the Shortcuts, GameMix, and RedZone channels opening day next Sunday, however, I expect that I will not bother with those "gimmicks" after that.

Don

 

[Jimbo]

donyoop,

I agree with you, We are paying the extra money for the D* gimmicks, not the HD.
If you are a fantasy football fan this is awesome, and justifiable to pay, however I am NOT and would like to have JUST my HD as a package, but D* wants to sell thier gimmicks so we all have to pay for something we don't want, in order to get womething we do want.

Jimbo

 

[asousa]

i dropped the "lack of HD Package" which was $11 a month. In 5 months you've got SuperFan for free. 7-10 games a week in HD is a million times better then watching the sunrise earth show EVERY day on Discovery....

 

[ToddD]

Here's my problem with the ST/SF package. I'm a lifelong Cowboys fan who does not live in Dallas. I have had ST for some time now so my total for the package this year is right at $265.00. As a Cowboys fan, 8 of our 16 games this year are national broadcasts....so for those 8 games that are not National- I'm paying $32.97 each.....while a lot less than going to the game and we WILL have all 16 games in HD , it's a lot of $$ to watch a game on TV.

 

[mercury]

The problem with charging for HD is this. The airwaves are FREE to all broadcasters and the guvment has said to all broadcasters that they MUST convert from SD to HD. So why not let the HD be free and charge us for the SD? D* and DISH have found a way to charge us twice for using their free radio spectrum. Once should be enough.

Also, as more and more people buy HD equipment, the price is falling rapidly for plasma, lcd, dlp, etc. Yet the cost of services keeps rising.......

I think D* is simply trying to find out how many people will pay $99 for HD NFL. If there is enough suckers, er, slap me, buyers, then they'll probably get aggressive hiking the HD package as well from 10.99 to god knows where.

 

[Jimbo]

asousa,

Only problem with what you did by dropping the HD lite package is you eliminated the ESPN Sunday nite game from your football line up

I personally will turn off the HD portion after the NFL is over and probably turn it back on next football saeson, therefore only paying for it for 4-5 months.

I would expect that all the playoff games will be in HD on network so no need for the HD package after December I think.

Jimbo